


Debriefing Disaster

by Markov_Debris



Series: Company Series [9]
Category: Torchwood
Genre: Episode: s01e13 End of Days, M/M, Series Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-19
Updated: 2017-10-19
Packaged: 2019-01-19 14:48:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12412374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Markov_Debris/pseuds/Markov_Debris
Summary: After the Jack’s return from death and reunion, during End of Days, the Captain debriefs the final member of his team, Ianto Jones.





	Debriefing Disaster

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is a Standalone story although if you have been following my Company and Awaiting Universe series.

They sat facing each other on the same side of the desk.  Jack wanted the answer but he was a little afraid to push the young man.

After he tearfully forgave Owen for shooting him and starting the rebellion, Jack knew he had to talk to them all about what happened.  He needed to understand their actions not just forgive them, forgiving them was what his heart wanted not his head.

He hadn’t really needed to ask Gwen about why she had turned against him, Rhys’ death aside, she had told him before they shot him and opened the Rift.  They talked as he went to the locker rooms to get dressed and he forgave her before she left him to wait for him by the entrance to the Hub.

Owen he had taken into his office as the medic’s sobs died down.  They had had the conversation neither had been ready or willing to have before.  It was enough for Jack to be sure that he was now dealing with the loss of Diane and had learnt his lesson about messing with the Rift.

Tosh was next.  Her motives were divided between the Bilis’ vision of her mother, the pain Gwen had caused when her sympathy over Rhys’ death had been rejected, and her lingering feelings for Owen and her belief that Jack had been wrong to just sack him because he disagreed. 

It was the last member of the team that he most dreaded talking to, and the one he would most readily forgave.  The one whose simple ‘No’ had hurt him most of all and left him feeling lost, helpless and alone.

“I saw Lisa,” Ianto said just before the silence became unbearable to Jack. 

“She looked human. She said if I didn’t open the rift people would die.”

Ianto was not looking at Jack.  He was sure the truth would anger Jack, destroy the forgiveness in their public kiss.

“Ianto, she’s gone,” Jack replied his voice slightly breaking.

All the months as their relationship had deepened, he thought Lisa’s ghost would have left.  In fact the last time she had been mentioned Jack had known she was a dull ache not a raw wound.

“I know.  Seeing her shocked me.  I ... I’m sorry,” there was a genuine confusion, true contrition but Jack could not stop himself from saying.

“You knew the dangers better than anyone.  When Tosh and I were stuck in 1941 you...” the words ‘shot Owen’ died on Jack’s lips as Ianto imperceptibly shrank away.

No one else would have noticed, of that Jack was sure.  Ianto was ever a subtle man but you don’t become someone’s lover without learning to read even the slightest movement.

It was the date, 1941, that caused that tiny reaction.  It should have only felt like yesterday, but it felt like years ago.  His mind instantly ignoring the days he had been dead.

In 1941 he had met the man whose name he had taken.  They had talked, gotten close, danced and kissed, all in a few hours.

Captain Harkness had helped Jack suppress the pain of knowing he wouldn’t see the Welshman who sat before him for the decades.  The immortal knew Ianto would never open the rift, Canary Wharf was a lesson too well learnt.

Only Owen had. 

Jack had returned to the present and grieved knowing the next day, over sixty years ago, Captain Harkness had died.

Tosh had witnessed his little romance.  Toshiko who was ignorant of Jack’s relationship with Ianto had innocently shared a piece of office gossip with a colleague, a friend, a man who had once declared a vengeful hatred of his boss, the killer of his girlfriend.

Perhaps that was why neither had wanted to share their relationship with the others until today, when he just couldn’t wait, couldn’t stand not having the touch of those soft lips against his for another minute.  Couldn’t bear the pain he had caused the young man with his death, hated the shy nature that wouldn’t let Ianto know how special he was.

So special it took less than a few hours to decide to forget him.  If Jack had had to wait decades he would have pushed his feelings into a hiding place or go mad, but he didn’t have to wait decades.

Instead yesterday (a few days ago), Jack had just gone into his office and mourned the man whose name he had claimed.  He had let Tosh comfort him and remembered the other times he had lived in 1941.

It had been hours before he realised the Welshman had gone home and he was alone.

Jack had not been interested in what had happened while he was in the past, why they had opened the rift.  He had not wanted the details of why Ianto had shot Owen.

The young man’s unexpected absence though had made him burn with curiosity.  Not losing a special someone was one of those things that always made Jack need to have life affirming sex, why at that moment didn’t Ianto want that too?

He had watched the internal CCTV footage.  Watched Ianto’s actions with pride.  Heard Owen’s words with horror.

Jack’s impulse was to go to Ianto.  To tell Ianto know how wrong Owen was despite, at the time, feeling guilty that the surly doctor may have been right.

He had been halted by the rift activity monitors, by the first reports of the rift fracturing across the world.

He remembered gently mocking Ianto about his portents of doom.  His quashing the young man’s arguments for using Emergency Protocol One without explanation, not that he really had an explanation beyond his own fear of the rift.  He saw now that, in his willingness to dismiss the argument, he had missed how his young lover was far from fine in the sincerity with which he would have sacrificed himself.

Ianto’s fingers twitched nervously under the older man’s gaze.  It brought Jack back, not to the present, but to several hours (days) ago.

He saw fingers covered in Blood.  Gwen’s fingers covered in Rhys’ blood as he washed them for her.

Ianto had had to wash his own hands of Lisa’s blood and with it he washed away, for a long while, the sparkle of his soul.

The full cruelty of Billis’ plan was suddenly there for Jack to see.

1941 was not just a distraction for Jack.  Not just a temptation for the others to open the rift.

It was to use Jack.  To expose the weakness in Torchwood’s greatest strength.

Ianto who gave so much and asked for so little had been made to feel insignificant by Owen’s harsh words, and by Jack’s compassion towards his namesake and Gwen.

“Oh Ianto,” Jack breathed heavily.

The young man started out of the chair and Jack jumped up to embrace him.  He held the Welshman close, and into another impassioned kiss.

It was the same as when they kissed earlier.  Hot fire burning inside him.  Passion and life flowed from Ianto into him, a blazing star compared to Gwen’s small spark.  He had put his coat on earlier because he still felt the cold of death but only now with this kiss was he starting to feel warm.

Jack became aware of the sounds of the others just before Ianto withdrew.  He could hear Gwen say, “He is bound to need something to eat or some coffee.  Ianto’ll know what he likes.”

Ianto’s face was surprised, a wonderful mixture of delight and confusion.  Then his mask was swiftly back in place as he stood, his suit smoothed from Jack’s rumpling as the door opened.

“The coffee machine broke I am still awaiting parts to fix it,” Ianto said in his quietly apologetic voice.

“Get a new one,” Jack stated quietly his eyes not leaving Ianto.

“In the meantime I’ll go out and get some from that coffee place you like,” he replied and turned to go before Jack could protest.

“We’ll come with you,” Tosh said swiftly, dragging Owen with her, in answer to the gestures Gwen was giving her, unseen by either Jack or Ianto.

The Captain watched Ianto as he led the others out of the Hub.  When he got back they were going to have a talk, Jack was going to find the words he had long ago needed to say.

 “How’s Rhys?” the immortal asked in order to cut off Gwen’s questions about him and the Welshman before she could voice them.

He was not really paying attention to her answers as he sat back behind his desk.  He was only half-heartedly answering her questions about what would have tempted him.  Yet he felt a warm glow of nostalgia as he remembered his travels with the Doctor.

Jack left his office in search of the others, mostly to rid himself of Gwen’s questions for a while.  To let himself think about what he had realised that night.  To let himself wonder about how and in what way he should pursue his relationship with Ianto.

The immortal hadn’t expected the Doctor’s hand to react as he approached.  He hadn’t expected the leap of joy as he realised that the almost forgotten desire for answers, so recently reawakened by his conversation with Gwen, was becoming a reality.

Without thought the Captain grabbed the bag, from where it was stashed under the bench and shoved the bubbling limb inside.  Deactivating the alarm and opening the cogwheel door with his wrist strap he headed out.

The lift was moving down the shaft but he couldn’t afford to wait, not for the lift to arrive, nor for the bombardment of questions his team would have, so he began to race up the stairs.  He could hear the lift moving as he climbed but he didn’t even spare a thought for his team in his desperation to reach the Doctor. 

Besides, he thought when he reached the end of the universe, he was going to see a man with a time machine, he could get his answers and be back any time he wanted to, if he wanted to.

 

 

A year later and Jack knew what he wished, what he wanted.  Where he wanted his relationship with Ianto to go.

He had the answers to all his questions, all realised during the worst of times.  Now he needed to know, more than anything in the universe, what Ianto’s answers to those questions were.

 

Fin

 

**Author's Note:**

> The next story in the Company Series is either Company of a Stranger or Company of a Ghost depending on which character's chronological order you wish to follow. The Company Series and Awaiting Universe follow Ianto's chronological order so I will be posting Company of a Stranger next. I will explain more in the notes for that story.


End file.
